Coaching or Therapy?

It is important to make the distinction between therapy and coaching. They are not competitive approaches to life challenges but rather complimentary methods to resolve issues and engage in personal growth. Generally speaking, therapy with its roots in psychiatry and medicine is designed more for individuals, couples or families who are experiencing difficulties that are significantly impacting their day to day living and whose treatment might require medication interventions as well as talk therapy. Coaching deals with the present and future and is solution focused. Goal setting, creating action plans, skill enhancement and cheerleading are at the heart of the coaching process which is usually more short term than therapy.  It is certainly reasonable for a couple or family to be engaging in therapy as individuals, a couple or as a family before or during family centered coaching.

How is Family Centered Coaching Different from Traditional Therapy?

• Coaching works to move people to a higher level of functioning rather than emotional healing.
• Therapy focuses more on past issues and feelings than on the present and future.
• Therapy deals with couples or families experiencing serious emotional distress. In therapy there is an assumption that the client needs healing while coaching assumes the client is whole.
• Therapy sessions often do not provide sufficient time to devote to relationship education, skill building and the seeking of external solutions to issues.
• Between 38% & 50% of couples who engage in traditional marriage therapy get divorced after two years
• Therapists are usually either a male or female creating a potential gender barrier for at least one party.